Local housing advocates say they are continuing their efforts to bring pressure on banks they say do not properly maintain and market foreclosed properties in minority neighborhoods as they do in mostly white areas.

Three weeks after a national fair housing group included Denver among the cities it says where Bank of America puts greater effort into the upkeep and sale of foreclosed properties in largely white neighborhoods than in those of color, advocates behind that investigation say other banks do the same thing.

“We don’t think the banks have set out to treat them differently, but that’s what’s happening,” said Arturo Alvarado, executive director of the Denver Metro Fair Housing Center, a fledgling nonprofit that focuses on the enforcement of fair housing laws.

“But it’s not just Bank of America. These are properties in communities of color that are not properly maintained by many banks. We see the disparate impact,” he said.

Denver was among five cities added last month to a complaint filed a year ago by the National Fair Housing Alliance with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, alleging discrimination in how BofA handles properties it owns, known in the industry as real estate owned, or REOs.

That brings to 18 the number of metropolitan areas in which the NFHA says one of the nation’s largest banks has discriminated in how it handles its REOs. The complaint notes the condition of more than 620 properties — 44 of them in Denver.

Bank of America in a statement has denied the allegations.

“We apply uniform practices to the management and marketing of vacant bank-owned properties across the U.S., regardless of their location. Any suggestion to the contrary is simply untrue,” BofA said in a statement after the latest allegations.

It said it is cooperating with HUD in an investigation of the allegations, first raised in 2009 by the NFHA but not filed as a formal complaint to the federal agency until September 2012.

Among the cities listed in the complaint where similar conditions allegedly exist are Phoenix; Chicago; Dallas; Milwaukee; Indianapolis; Oakland, Calif.; and Orlando, Fla.

In June, Wells Fargo settled a similar complaint over how it maintained REO properties, agreeing to invest $39 million in 45 communities — including Denver — to improve housing in minority neighborhoods hit hard by foreclosures.

David is a member of the Investigations Team and has been at The Denver Post since 1999. He was a founding member of the team before moving on to cover banking, finance, human services, consumer affairs, and business investigations. He has also worked at newspapers in New York, St. Louis and Detroit over a 35-year career.

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